Economy

The rest of the nations of the eurozone are also now implementing austerity measures, and most of them are also starting to fall into recession. The economic pain in Europe is just beginning and it will go on for quite a long time.

David Frum, former George W. Bush speechwriter, had the guts to acknowledge that the Tea Party's combination of expensive entitlement programs and tax cuts is something entirely different from a traditional political program: "This isn't conservatism: It's a going-out-of-business sale for the Baby Boom generation." The economic motive is growing ever more naked, and has nothing to do with any principle that could be articulated by Goldwater or Reagan, or indeed with any principle at all. The political imperative is to preserve the economic cloak of unreality that the Boomers have wrapped themselves in.

But the reward is likely to further strain relations with Pakistan, which are currently being renegotiated after a border clash in November in which American warplanes killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. And it met with a contemptuous reception among Mr. Saeed’s supporters, one of whom described the reward as an “April Fool’s joke” and ridiculed the notion that Mr. Saeed was a hunted man.

A growing body of research suggests that the recent recession may have brought an enduring shift in the geography of American growth. Places like Gwinnett County near Atlanta, Lake County, north of Orlando, and San Joaquin County in California’s central valley, where housing booms were fueled by borrowed money, may now become long-term laggards under the weight of those debts.

The federal appeals courts had been split on the question, though most of them prohibited strip searches unless they were based on a reasonable suspicion that contraband was present. The Supreme Court did not say that strip searches of every new arrestee were required; it ruled, rather, that the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches did not forbid them.

“Quantitative easing” is nothing but a 21st century euphemism to replace a 20th century euphemism: “monetizing debt”. Those with any understanding of language realize that euphemisms are expressions we create when we want to (more or less) lie about a subject – because telling the plain truth is too unpalatable.

Justin A. Rockefeller, 32, the fourth-generation descendant of John D. Rockefeller, the oil tycoon, is a partner at the venture capital firm Richmond Global and a director of business development at Addepar, a financial software start-up. The real estate heir Joshua Kushner, 26, helped to found Vostu, a large Brazilian online game company, and recently raised $40 million for his own technology investment firm, Thrive Capital.

While many of them don’t know how to program code, they have a powerful combination in the start-up scene: wealth, wits and a well-connected family.

In the past decade, Africa's inter-regional exports of petroleum have shifted away from Europe and the remaining Asia Pacific region (which excludes China and Japan), towards North America, China and to a much lesser extent, South America (Figure 12). If these trends continue, by 2021, Africa’s number one and two export destinations would become North America and China, respectively, with Europe in third place.

Industry chiefs are furious about what they see as a media-led smear campaign against a product that has been used in the US since the early 1990s and meets federal food safety standards.

Earlier this week, they launched a fight back - unveiling a new slogan "Dude, it's beef" and enlisting the help of Texas governor and former presidential candidate Rick Perry, who dutifully chowed down on a burger containing the stuff on a visit to a processing plant in South Sioux City, Nebraska.

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David Frum, former George W. Bush speechwriter, had the guts to acknowledge that the Tea Party's combination of expensive entitlement programs and tax cuts is something entirely different from a traditional political program: "This isn't conservatism: It's a going-out-of-business sale for the Baby Boom generation.

Wow - I know of no Tea Partier who wants the expensive entitlement programs and tax cuts. Here is a much better look at generally what most people who consider themselves "tea partiers" believe. Note - tea party is not generally a "defined" group but rather a movement:

What is the purpose of sentences like that other than to divide the populace? I wonder if the "journalist" not being American can relate to the ideas of the Tea Party? Stephen Marche apparently has a history of ad-hominem attacks. Is it an ad-hominem attack to point out a person uses ad-hominem attacks? I found the article to be much more of a political commentary rather than a discussion of the real problems we face.

Jdargis, I also found it interesting that out of that whole article you choose that particular paragraph to use for the summary. Why? It didn't seem to really covey the content of the article, but I would have considered it certainly the most politically charged.

So let's see what could a real discussion include:

We are broke as a country (world?), have too much debt, and are facing a serious funding crisis.

We have an older generation of citizens that are entirely dependent on the government for retirement. It was promised and they believed and relied on it.

We have a young population that faces a much different future due to resource constraints.

There are not enough resources (capital or natural) for this to continue much longer.

What do we do? I don't believe there is a solution. We are all going to face some severe pain. Older folks are not going to receive what they were promised from the politicians. The young are not going to have the same easy life as their parents and grand parents. So while I don't know what we should do, I'm pretty sure divisive articles and commentary are not part of the solution.

It looks as though the hand puppet, George Bush, was reading from a prepared script.

Oil and Energy believes that the Plan was generated way back in the time of the Shah. (Remember him?)

I think that the Prophet was right. A mountain of gold was uncovered by the Euphrates and the Faithful were instructed to have nothing to do with it.

We in the West have built our civilisation on this wealth. (Oil, for the profoundly Left brained thinkers). We did it for the noblest of intentions, the freeing of slaves. As Admiral Rickover explained all those years ago.

Then every thing include itself into power,
Power into will, will into appetite.
and appetite, a universal wolf
(So doubly seconded with will and power),
Must make perforce it's universal prey.
And last eat up himself.
W. Shakespeare.

As we watch the sporadic downward spiral of Europe and the US "economies" (I prefer civilizations) it's curious that no one acknowledges that all of the underpinnings for this disaster have been in place for MANY decades. The statistics documenting the economy are regularly, if not rigorously collected, distributed and analyzed.

1) Aging population 2) loss of national competitiveness vs other nations 3)morbid obesity/illness growing at alarming rates 4) decliining public school standards and attendance 4) immoral and corrupt political class. With these facts, do statistics really matter?

As an 8+ generation American it saddens me to hypothesize that the American Empire may be the least successful and most incompetent of any major civilization in history. Let's not take the very real advances in science as something that would have only happened here. Our Founders gave us an extrordinary framework which has obviously served us well. I ask myself, why do we only refer to the Framers and not someone more recent? Because there is no one!

We have essentially taken over one of the most resource rich pieces of land in the world and in a short space of time, recklessly exploited it and now have little to show for the squandering of that extracted wealth. The 300+ years of European colonialism has essentially ended and the free capital that sustained Europe (primarily) is now gone. We are witnessing the results.The argument as to whether the rich should pay more taxes to strengthen our nation is insulting. Of course, the politicians and career bureaucrats currently in place do not recommend any change in direction or outcome.

How will we solve this? I think the smart money has recognized the probability of social (not economic) collapse and confirms the continuous consolidation of the global corporate class. At the end of the day, goods and services will be supplied and consumed. Who manages that process will unfortunately probably not be an elected polity of any value to the average citizen. Increasing rage in the streets, whether in Greece, Spain, Florida or elsewhere only portend the coming disaster. I hope enough of us will recognize the coming train wreck and work to avoid a society that Orwell, Huxley and a host of movies have posited for our future.

As we watch the sporadic downward spiral of Europe and the US "economies" (I prefer civilizations) it's curious that no one acknowledges that all of the underpinnings for this disaster have been in place for MANY decades. The statistics documenting the economy are regularly, if not rigorously collected, distributed and analyzed.

1) Aging population 2) loss of national competitiveness vs other nations 3)morbid obesity/illness growing at alarming rates 4) decliining public school standards and attendance 4) immoral and corrupt political class. With these facts, do statistics really matter?

As an 8+ generation American it saddens me to hypothesize that the American Empire may be the least successful and most incompetent of any major civilization in history. Let's not take the very real advances in science as something that would have only happened here. Our Founders gave us an extrordinary framework which has obviously served us well. I ask myself, why do we only refer to the Framers and not someone more recent? Because there is no one!

We have essentially taken over one of the most resource rich pieces of land in the world and in a short space of time, recklessly exploited it and now have little to show for the squandering of that extracted wealth. The 300+ years of European colonialism has essentially ended and the free capital that sustained Europe (primarily) is now gone. We are witnessing the results.The argument as to whether the rich should pay more taxes to strengthen our nation is insulting. Of course, the politicians and career bureaucrats currently in place do not recommend any change in direction or outcome.

How will we solve this? I think the smart money has recognized the probability of social (not economic) collapse and confirms the continuous consolidation of the global corporate class. At the end of the day, goods and services will be supplied and consumed. Who manages that process will unfortunately probably not be an elected polity of any value to the average citizen. Increasing rage in the streets, whether in Greece, Spain, Florida or elsewhere only portend the coming disaster. I hope enough of us will recognize the coming train wreck and work to avoid a society that Orwell, Huxley and a host of movies have posited for our future.